A single tweet (#EvanendruNinaithaai, #KamalHaasan232) has shattered the notion that Kamal will only work with “yes men” directors, and not with new-gen filmmakers who have a very clear vision.
For a while now, there has been some speculation that Kamal Haasan and Lokesh Kanagaraj would be coming together for a movie. I even got first-hand news that the young filmmaker was often seen in the Raaj Kamal premises in Alwarpet — but something told me to keep my hopes down. Yes, even after Twitter exploded with endless discussions after Lokesh announced that he would be revealing details about his new film on September 16. Indiaglitz went as far as disclosing the title: “The hot buzz is that this biggie has been titled ‘Evan Endru Ninaithaai’ which is the starting line of the popular song in Vishwaroopam that played during that unforgettable character transformation of Kamal from effeminate [dancer] to precision killer.” Others, meanwhile, were saying that this announcement has nothing to do with Kamal. It’s actually about the Telugu film Lokesh has committed to make.
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Baradwaj Rangan 
abishekspeare
September 16, 2020
The significance of this to someone from my generation is unmatchable. This is the first time kamal is going away from home territory since i started watching movies. I was never there to watch the pre-Baba Rajini movies in theater so watching Petta was an amazing experience. Hope this is something like that.
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apala
September 16, 2020
மரண மாஸ் waiting BR-ji! 🙂
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Voldemort
September 16, 2020
Agree with abhishekspeare, for someone of my generation, the last Kamal movie which was a blockbuster is Dasavataram. Man, the buzz around that movie was insane!
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Rasi
September 16, 2020
After a long time, an article where you let your Kamal fanboy flag fly high!
Covid has to cooperate indeed
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Heisenberg
September 17, 2020
The tagline sounds like Keyser Soze kinda character 🙂
Hope Kamal’s (mis)adventure with politics pulls him back to movies and continue for another decade in age appropriate roles.
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Madan
September 17, 2020
Interesting that this is happening at all. Wonder if Kamal left it too late. He’s 65 now. This becomes a bit like Bob De Niro trying to be edgy all of a sudden. With a well etched character, I am sure Lokesh Kanagaraj can utilise Kamal’s phenomenal talents but would it yet again be haunted by the need to balance it with ‘fan’ needs (even if the fans have voted with their feet in the last several outings)?
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Aman Basha
September 17, 2020
Am I the only one who’s feeling slight trepidation when it comes to this film? Kamal pretty frankly said he accepted Indian 2 only because of politics, what if this is the same? The film is supposed to be ready for Summer 2021, don’t know how much of Indian 2 is left but this one mostly has to be a quickie. Lokesh Kanagaraj has made Kaithi, which was a nice blend of mass and genre, if Master works out well then, it might be possible that Kamal may have a big blockuster after maybe ‘Dasavatharam’.
PS: Was Vishwaroopam a hit despite the ban? The films written by Him like CR and UV didn’t work, CR maybe because of the clash against Vedhalam so maybe only UV was the downright flop in recent days.
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MANK
September 17, 2020
I don’t know what’s the big deal? . Lokesh Kanagaraj is no Myyskin or even Karthik Subbaraj. Maanagaram was well crafted popular entertainment;though i felt it was too calculated, while Kaithi was an interesting, yet very flawed attempt at doing a mishmash of Hollywood genre thriller and masala. . And going by his recent outings, his political work (and the fact that he is now 66), Kamal doesn’t seem much interested in movies right now. i am not really expecting anything great, though would be happy to be surprised.
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KS
September 17, 2020
Lets hope this movie actually happens as planned, instead of getting shelved because of “creative differences”. After all, he does have a reputation of being a limelight hogger and creative bully for whom directors and music directors should serve only as puppets. Like “initial prechana varakoodathu-nu naan dhan soru potu valathutrukken” types. So that he can indulge in some over-the-top shenanigans to show off his look-ma-I’m-acting, his puratchi political ideologies, his singing talents, or other indulgences.
The ideal situation is where Kamal loses interest and just goes through the motions out of a sense of kadamai, instead of doing his trademark adigaprasangi-thanam and poking into every aspect of its making. It was a joy to watch him in Vettaiyadu Vilayadu, where he was effortlessly stylish and even his disinterest lent a dignified weariness to his role. It was probably his last role where he looked like Kamal, and spoke like a normal person. Unlike most of his more recent movies, where his performance was overly ostentatious and gimmicky, inevitably involving some outlandish costuming, makeup, dialects, etc. Kamal has no need to try too hard any more, and his shenanigans are getting tiresome (at best) and obnoxious (at worst).
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shaviswa
September 17, 2020
I am not excited at all. Kamal’s last hit was umm….when was that? Sorry…I am not able to recollect. He wants money to run his party now. So anything will go.
PS: BTW whatever happened to Indian 2? Will probably join the list of Kamal’s incomplete films which seems to be increasing offlate.
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Ravi K
September 18, 2020
“Indian 2” production stopped due to the one-two-punch of the fatal crane accident in February and Covid-19 soon after that. I assume they’ll resume production when it’s safe to do so, as long as that time is not too far off.
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Ravi K
September 18, 2020
Madan wrote: “With a well etched character, I am sure Lokesh Kanagaraj can utilise Kamal’s phenomenal talents but would it yet again be haunted by the need to balance it with ‘fan’ needs (even if the fans have voted with their feet in the last several outings)?”
I wonder if these are really “fan needs” or if they are “Kamal needs,” i.e, how Kamal wants to see himself on-screen.
Who makes up the Kamal fanbase these days? Is it mostly people who lived through his 80s/90s heyday? The 2000s kids might have seen his earlier hits because of their parents, though the films released in the 2000s probably wouldn’t have done much to maintain that younger fanbase.
Did his flops in the 2000s at least open well due to the fans, or did they not even get a good opening?
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Viswanathan Raja
September 18, 2020
Rajini Kanth &Kamal Hasan did not have charm as what it was . Reasons many including their age . Lokesh Kanagaraj ,I have seen the movie ,the movie has holes . It is my assumption he may have stuff for couple of movies . Kamal due to his sagging Carrer both in movies and politics . The movie if at all started and come to screen (chances 50-50) . It is just a movie
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Madan
September 18, 2020
Ravi K: Exactly why I put fan in quotes. I am referring to how Kamal took over Vettaiyadu Vilayadu and demanded more screen time in the name of serving fans. If he does that again, he may well sabotage this project also. Both Kamal and Rajni in different ways have become too big to surrender to a director’s needs.
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H. Prasanna
September 18, 2020
I think Kamal’s star/actor brand is good enough to write a story around if a director is so inclined. The only kind of movie he needs to do now is one in celebration of his prolific career. I am glad that he is letting other directors do it and he has stopped making homage movies to himself like V1, V2, UV, and Sabash Naidu. Hopefully, this will just be a straight homage like Petta. In fact, the parts where Petta tries to be a film on its own/away from the star are where it failed.
P.S. I would really get excited if he writes/directs as a show runner small-scale plot heavy, dialogue-orgy TV series. His work as writer in Virumaandi, etc. are so fascinating. Or, if he writes for Vetrimaaran or something.
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Ghost Who Walks
September 18, 2020
@MANK
The reasons that you mentioned are the exact ones that make me hopeful for this movie.
Some one like Mysskin or Selvaraghavan is probably too independent to be able to work with Kamal. In fact, if my memory serves right, both were on board for some movie with him before they opted out or were replaced. Some one who can hold his own and yet be open to make compromises is the only way that will work, like GVM did with VV.
At this point in his career, I’ll settle for anything like Petta or Kaithi with Kamal just being there.
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Ravi K
September 21, 2020
Madan: “Both Kamal and Rajni in different ways have become too big to surrender to a director’s needs.”
Absolutely. And it shows that despite being an exceptional talent, he’s just like any big hero in that he takes primacy over the director.
But I get the sense that the directors making Rajini films lately seem to WANT to make the kind of films Rajini wants. And what Rajini wants also happens to be what the audiences want to see. Maybe there’s a small group of die-hard Kamal apologists who appreciate his recent films, but not even film buffs seem that interested. Maybe time will be kinder to them, and they’ll be seen as flawed films worth watching for some interesting ideas.
I hope he’ll finish “Sabash Naidu,” as I liked Balram Naidu from “Dasavatharam,” and the prospect of another Kamal comedy is always exciting.
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Madan
September 21, 2020
“Maybe there’s a small group of die-hard Kamal apologists who appreciate his recent films, but not even film buffs seem that interested.” – Yes, basically, Kamala thavara yaarukaga indha padangal padhivu seiya patthathu is a marmakathai. I hesitate to use the term self indulgence in an Indian context because it is often imposed by a tyranny of low expectations and LCD-pandering compulsions. But in Kamal’s case, it sadly seems to be applicable.
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Anonymous Violin
September 21, 2020
More than a gangster film (which we’ve had quite a few of recently), I wonder what it would look like if Kamal did a detective movie or even a buddy cop movie (with Jayaram/Ramesh Aravind for the supporting role).
Regardless, as a member of gen z, and Kamal fan, I’m hyped.
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Karthik
September 22, 2020
It’s hard to be a fan of Kamal (not just the actor) and not be disappointed in the last fifteen or so years of his career. I cant completely blame his personality or self-indulgence for that. The early 2000s are a kind of inflection point in audience sensibilities. The growing access to global content and the cable TV boom, all widened the gap between the so-called A and BC audiences, and it happened rather quickly. Amongst those who had dominated the industry in the 90s, Rajni, Kamal and Mani Ratnam all took box office beatings around that time. And of those three, Rajni has always had his ear closest to the pan-Tamil commercial sensibilities, and Mani Ratnam has been the one least compromising in his cinematic visions. The former quickly regrouped and jumped on the Shankar bandwagon to commercial success, and the latter stayed reasonably honest to his cinematic visions. Kamal tried hard to do both, seemingly all by himself, but the odd Vishwaroopam aside, he’s arguably fallen short on both counts. As a fan, its his commercial excesses that have been most disappointing, be it dated “Crazy” comic routines in movies like ManMadhanAmbu, Mumbai express, Uttama Villain, the tiresome “misunderstood husband” trope in film after film, and the even more tiresome “preaching to the paapaan” with nothing either new or nuanced to say. Even his remakes havent offered much more than the originals like they used to in the 80s and 90s.
In hindsight, he really missed out on collaboration with the new gen filmmakers of the early 2000s who, more important than having strong cinematic sensibilities, were also very attuned to bridging the new commerce-cinema divide. With regards to the Lokesh Kanagaraj collaboration now, I’m inclined to just hold out especially in light of Kamal’s political ambitions that are likely to drive his excesses, and like MANK said, Kanagaraj is no Subburaj or Selvaraj.
All that said, I cant help thinking that the very proclivity to excesses which has let him down these past years have also been responsible for the dense cinematic visions in movies like Hey Ram and Virumaandi. Going by some of his interviews, and his penchant for multiple roles (in front and behind the screen), I see him as someone who wants to be everything and do everything. When it all works, the result can be astounding, and when it doesn’t, well..that’s still a heckuva career that can stand up to any actor’s in any industry.
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apala
September 22, 2020
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Veda
September 24, 2020
I doubt whether anyone can direct Kamal really well now, the way current crop are dismembering Rajni these days…
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